Lebanon: Queer people shut out of wartime shelters
Displaced LGBTQ people in Lebanon face homophobia in ‘safe’ spaces
This is an edited and translated version of an article in the French LGBTQIA+ magazine Têtu.
“And now, where do we go?”: Queer people under the bombs in Lebanon
By Céline Mouchart
In Lebanon, the resumption of Israeli bombing has left more than a million people homeless. But for LGBT+ people, the shelters opened by the state often remain inaccessible, forcing organizations to fill in the gaps.
At first glance, the apartment, located in Beirut, looks like any other. A large, open-plan living area, furnished with houseplants, opens onto two balconies, and two bedrooms each contain two bunk beds. A kitchen and a bathroom complete the space. A few things, however, betray the true nature of the place: the decor is sparse, there are no photos, few personal belongings, and in one of the rooms, a small backpack placed on a mattress without sheets suggests a recent arrival.
Here, photos taken from the windows and balconies are forbidden, so that the building’s exact location cannot be identified. The residents are prohibited from giving out the address. To see loved ones, they must therefore arrange to meet them a little further away and never take a taxi directly to the door. The door will soon be replaced with a sturdier one, made of steel, and surveillance cameras will be installed in the stairwell to increase the building’s security.
Like the apartment on the landing opposite, this apartment is managed by the Lebanon-based MENA Organization for Services, Advocacy, Integration & Capacity Development (MOSAIC), an association that advocates for and supports LGBTQ people in Lebanon and across the Middle East and North Africa. In peacetime, this organization ran a shelter for LGBT+ people evicted from their homes or victims of violence. With the resumption of Israeli bombing since March, the priority has shifted, and the organization has opened a second apartment to increase its capacity and address the emergency.
The war between Israel and Hezbollah has forced more than a million people to flee their homes, particularly in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley, where dozens of villages have been evacuated. Displaced populations are finding refuge with relatives, in tents, or in shelters opened by the state.
Karim categorically refuses to go to one of these shelters. “I would rather die than go to a collective shelter,” says this young gay man, forced to leave his home in Dahiya, the southern suburb of Beirut, which was heavily bombed by the Israeli army. To explain his position, he first cites “the humiliation of having to go to a communal shelter where we have to live on top of each other and wait for poor-quality food.” There’s another reason, he adds: “I would be forced to live surrounded by homophobic men…”
So, when the bombings began, Karim found refuge with an acquaintance in the Geitaoui neighborhood, in the northeast of Lebanon’s capital. It’s an area he fears after being beaten in the street there three years ago by members of the Soldiers of God, a far-right Christian group. Since that attack, which landed him in the hospital for a month, the young man has become much more careful about how he dresses and avoids dangerous places at all costs.
“We had to expand the walls.” Sandy Mteirek, executive director of the Lebanon-based LGBT+ association Helem, understands that queer people don’t feel safe in the communal living conditions of shelters. They aren’t even welcome, she observes. “The national action plan implemented in response to the war was completely non-inclusive, not only for LGBT+ people, but also for single women, people with disabilities, and, generally, anyone who falls outside the norm.”
Faced with this oversight by Lebanon’s government, Helem opened three shelters to address the community’s homelessness crisis during the previous resurgence of the conflict in 2024, during what was called the Third Lebanon War, between Israel and Hezbollah. Two years later, the association hoped that lessons had been learned and that the reception of marginalized populations would be improved. “Unfortunately,” sighs Sandy Mteirek, “once again this year, the admission criteria for collective shelters have left a huge number of people without housing.” She summarizes that the shelters still tend to accept only traditional families.
This de facto exclusion isn’t even announced, she explains, and more often than not, it’s unconscious. Simply put, no effort is made for better inclusion. In practice, the demand is so high that available spaces must be used to their fullest potential. Single people are therefore often refused entry, so as not to block a room where an entire family could be housed. However, regularly rejected by their biological families, queer people in Lebanon tend to live alone.
While advocating for improvements, Helem tries to address what can be addressed: “In times of war, we became a daytime refuge,” explains Sandy Mteirek in front of the reinforced door of her association’s premises. “When the Israeli army issues evacuation orders for entire neighborhoods, members of the community come here to find shelter while waiting for the bombing to stop.”
The need for assistance doesn’t end with housing. In war-torn Lebanon, there is a shortage of food, blankets, and psychological support—difficulties that, for LGBT+ people, compound an already precarious situation.
“The government didn’t wait for the war to neglect minorities,” notes Karen, a social worker at the Mosaic association. “Even in normal times, if a queer person goes to the police to report violence, the police mock them, or worse…”
Her colleague Samar, herself displaced from her home in Dahiya, adds: “The phone calls have intensified with the war. So we’ve had to expand our facilities and sometimes take in more than we can, because the people who call us are the most marginalized and have no safety net left.” On her desk, during our visit alone, the shelter’s waiting list had grown by four more names.
Sixteen people are currently living in Mosaic’s two apartments, on a temporary basis. Some of them stay only a few days, others up to several months. “We support them during this transition period, giving them time to find housing and get back on their feet,” explains Karen. From the window, Samar gestures to the neighboring buildings with a smile: “Over there are two apartments where queer people live. On the other side, there used to be the offices of an LGBT+ media outlet. And the grocery store downstairs is also very queer-friendly. We’re happy in this neighborhood!”
Solidarity helps compensate for the lack of funding, emphasizes Bechara Samneh, director of the Mosaic organization: “For example, 80% of the furniture in our first apartment came from donations. When a crisis hits, the community comes together to support each other!” This mobilization, however, is not enough to dispel the feeling of abandonment, which worsens during times of conflict. Karim provides an example. “Last week, I went to see my parents in the village in the Bekaa. My mother was making a list of things God should help us with: the war, the bombings near the house and… homosexuals,” he laughs. “If she only knew!”
